Page 223

Father and son regard each other in silence. I don’t know what Lukas’s eyes say to his boy, but it seems like it lasts a long, long time.

Eventually, though, Lukas turns back to the microphones. Leans forward. Clears his throat.

“Eighteen years ago,” he begins, “I killed my wife.”

79

LUKAS

@aaborowski_nyc:why is #lukaslazarev trending what did i miss

@kels_mktg:CNN IS LIVESTREAMING FROM THE PRECINCT. he's about to make a statement. oh my god.

@tikibarfly:"eighteen years ago I killed my wife" WHAT

@danielmrojas:wait wait wait he's saying she was sick?? she had leukemia???

@aaborowski_nyc:i literally just sat down at my desk with a coffee and now i'm sobbing

@tikibarfly:fdasfjdksal;j i am going to be physically ill

@danielmrojas: bro his SON is in the room. his son is RIGHT THERE.

@aaborowski_nyc:i need to call my dad.

The room erupts.

Gasps ripple through the crowd. Camera shutters fire in a deafening cascade, flash after flash strobing across my vision. Questions are shouted from every direction, overlapping intomeaningless noise:Mr. Lazarev, how did you—andWas it premeditated—andDid your son know?—

I don’t answer any of them. I just stand here at the podium, hands folded in front of me, and wait.

Eventually, the noise dies down. It always does. People run out of breath. Cameras run out of batteries. The human appetite for spectacle has limits, even if those limits are depressingly high.

As the chaos subsides, I find myself thinking about how I ended up here.

Over forty years ago, I arrived in this country with nothing but stolen cash and a willingness to do whatever it took to survive. I clawed my way up through the gutters of Brighton Beach and built an empire on a foundation of blood and broken bones and sheer fucking stubbornness. I buried rivals and bribed officials and carved out a kingdom that stretched from shipping yards to boardrooms.

I was untouchable. Invincible. A god among insects.

Then Elena tripped and fell into my arms outside a record store, and I learned that gods can bleed just like anyone else.

I had twenty good years with her. Those years held music in the kitchen and bore us a son who—for a little while, at least—called forme,his Papa,when he found monsters that needed fighting.

And then the cancer came, and I learned that some monsters cannot be fought.

I tried anyway. Hell, I carved myself apart trying. How much fucking blood and flesh did I give up for her?

Whatever it was, I would’ve given more. All of it, if she’d asked.

She didn’t, though. In the end, she asked me for the one thing I couldn’t refuse her. The one thing that would haunt me for the rest of my days.

So I gave it to her.

I held her as she went, I buried her in the place where we first met, I kept her secret for eighteen years, and I let my son hate me because that’s what she wanted.

I look at Kirill now, standing near the back of the room. His face is a mask, but I know him. Even after all this time, Iknowhim. I know the damage I’ve done.

But I also know that some promises are worth keeping, even when they cost you everything.